Oliver Basketball Video

Who is the worst parent in this video? Me for helping and therefore making him weak? or Levin for rejecting him to toughen him up?

Christmas

I guess Christmas was all about Oliver. The only pictures that really turned out are of him. Santa brought the kids this ball tent. Oliver climbed in and did not want to come out. He didn't even want to open his other presents. Once I threw the present in to him to open and he did it. I hated to make him cry in order to open a present . . I confess we "helped" him a few times.

Santa Claus also brought Oliver this rocking bear. He also brought both the kids a sled. More pictures of that later, but I think the pictures are not even on the sled Santa brought but one I bought at a yard sale here earlier in the summer.
Leah got a laptop, "Leaptop" from Santa and we gave her a cash register and play food that she likes a lot. There were plenty of other presents, but I think those were the main ones. Oh, and Oliver's basketball hoop. I'll post the video of that later too.

Christmas Eve Party

The bishopric hosted a Christmas Eve party for the singles in our ward. Since the other ward already had the church we hosted it at the Embassy which meant we had to recruit other Embassy employees to help us escort. We had a great time. We had two turkeys and a ham and polished them both off!

We are the international ward in Moscow so as you can see we have quite the variety. Most of us are American, but we also have German (bishops family) and in this picture alone we have Philippines, Nigeria, Chad, Zimbabwe and maybe Ghana and Congo. I can't remember, but we definitely have them as members of our ward. Not everyone could come and some people had left by the time we took this picture. Russians were protesting the recent election which kept some people at home and some people had to work.

Levin spent most of his time hunting down people who'd never been to the Embassy before and were struggling to find the gate. And security isn't exactly easy at the Embassy either.

I got tons of compliments on my turkey and Levin didn't even try any! He was always too busy. I did a lot of cooking for it since Levin was mostly in charge. I need tips from people on how to host a dinner AND look nice when it's finally time to eat. I didn't want to cook in my party clothes so I just put on something I wouldn't get too hot in. But before I knew it I was using shopping carts to haul my food downstairs while begging people to watch the kids while I went back for more and I somehow never got time to change! That has happened to me, oh . . . every time I have cooked for people. Obviously I need to figure this out or maybe just start cooking earlier.

Anyway we had a great time! Africans are always late and I always had this same problem in Nigeria that by the time we got there it felt like we were already sending them home.

Leah Ballerina

Leah started ballet class this week. Classes at the Embassy started in the fall, but you had to be 3 and Leah wasn't. She wanted to take ballet class soooooo badly. I decided to ask if now that she was 3 she could join and was told she could. We went to the first ballet class and Leah was the happiest I've ever seen. She constantly was smiling, a smile of pure joy, not hyperness. She was quiet and well-behaved and I was so proud of her! After class the Russian teachers explained to me that the other girls (3 and 4 year olds) have been working for almost 4 months now so that I could bring Leah to the next class and "we'll see how she does if she knows what we expect of her" and if decide if she can stay. I felt so sad and worried even though I understood their point. I didn't want to be one of "those parents" that pushes and pressures her all week, but I didn't want her to fail either. I did try a few things.
We borrowed some ballet clothes so luckily we hadn't put a lot money into it.
Friday we went to the 2nd class. Leah is so cute and wants to hold my hand and acts shy when we get there. I love it! This is what we reviewed the most during the week.
Me: Leah, during ballet class who do you watch?
Leah: The teacher!
Me: Leah, when Kaelynn (her friend) is being silly in ballet class who do you watch, her or the teacher?
Leah: The teacher!
Well . . . . Leah was so distracted by the other girls. Kaelynn was well behaved this time, unlike Monday when she got kicked out of class. But Leah still kept daydreaming and I think was mostly focusing on how pretty she felt. She loves when the teachers give her attention and move her legs for her, but she forgets to move her own legs then.
After class we hung around and I was a little nervous. I knew they wouldn't let her stay. But I went and asked and they said yes! They said, "she did a little better this week, so after the break bring her back Jan 9th and we will let her stay and see how she does."
YEAH!!! I don't care so much except that Leah really, really, likes ballet class. The teachers are strict but she doesn't seem to mind. They will have a recital in May and I hear that it is amazing, but we'll see. Most important is that Leah keeps liking it. I think she mostly likes wearing her "bootiful ballet dress and tights."

Failure

I am a failure as a mother. A friend at church gave us an IKEA gingerbread house kit. Maybe we weren't careful enough, but two of the walls were broken and well, I couldn't fix it. I made the frosting, which by the way all the recipes I found online included raw eggs. So we ended up with Leah decorating a roof and Oliver eating candy and pieces of the wall. The walls were actually quite tasty. Oh yeah and the commissary had promised to have their Christmas candy out so I got the kids all excited, we go to the commissary, and nothing. So we used marshmallows, fruit Mentos, and M&M's. Worst gingerbread house ever!

Leah's Birthday video

Leah's Birthday

I am a little late in posting about Leah's birthday. Better late than never right?

Although you can't see them in this picture we had a little party with Aunt Dani and Bo when they were here visiting even though it was almost a week before Leah's actual birthday. We had purple cupcakes which she then informed me she needed a cake when all along she's been talking about cupcakes. Oh well, at least she got the color of frosting she wanted. Bo brought this sweet party hat for her.
She got a few presents including this Elmo Doctor Kit. We've already lost the pieces and can't even find the box. I need to do a toy purge before Christmas. She also got a Play Doh fun factory from grandma and a Dora book and some sweet things from Aunt Dani including some cookies in a cute Hello Kitty tin.
A few days later we had another party with our friends the Petersons. They are so sweet and the kids made homemade wrapping paper. We had cake this time, again with purple frosting. James is allergic to anything corn and powdered sugar has corn starch so that is why a corner is frosting-free. We also had left-over Thanksgiving pie. For some reason Bruce looks like he's crying in this picture, but he wasn't.
I posted another picture of him to redeem his beautiful and happy face.
The favorite present she got wasn't the game Don't Break The Ice that we got for her, it was the Masha and Medved movie that I think baby Peterson gave to Leah. It is a Russian cartoon about a little girl and a bear. It is adoreable and Leah loves it and just refers to it as her new show. There is some New Years special somewhere in Moscow so there are posters everywhere and Leah always says, "look my new show!"

Happy Birthday to my sweet Leah! She can test my patience, but when she feels sorry she makes sure to let me know that she is my best daughter. I don't know how I got so lucky to have such an affectionate girl who gives me "the best hug ever in town" too. I love it! She has become a great sister to Oliver too. They have their fights, but she is usually very quick to share - amazingly quick sometimes. We love you Leah!!